Letters to the editor for Jan. 27, 2012

The “hate speech” card is being played once again. This time it is Katrina Plotz using it against Jake MacAulay in her Dec. 30 letter “Spreading hate.”

This comes as no surprise since Jake and Bradlee (known as the Sons of Liberty – see their website) espouse a biblical view of homosexuality that honors God’s Word. They would rather be biblically correct than politically correct – even if it means being called homophobic and hateful.

I know Jake and Bradlee and there is no hate in their hearts for homosexuals. They know that God loves the homosexual just as He loves them. Ms. Plotz is conflating disagreement with homosexual behavior with “hate.”

Jake and Bradlee have been called hate mongers and bigots simply because they stand by the Bible’s boundaries for healthy sexual behavior – boundaries that are constantly being validated by medical data. Doctors recognize that homosexuals have more depression, more illness, shorter life spans and more suicides.

According to God’s Word, the homosexual lifestyle is a sin that has serious physical, emotional and spiritual consequences for persons involved in that behavior.

God loves all people; He doesn’t love sinful behavior. This behavior has consequences for society as well as individuals.

Just look at the AIDS crisis. If we really care about “the safety and well-being of all who live and work here” as Ms. Plotz states, we would not be trying to normalize such dangerous, unhealthy behavior for our youth.

If our young people come to accept homosexuality as a normal, alternative lifestyle without dangerous consequences, we can expect to see an increase in HIV and AIDS.

We already are. According to the CDC, the numbers of young homosexual men diagnosed with HIV is rising at a heartbreaking 12 percent every year. This increase in young homosexual men is, 10 times higher than in the homosexual community overall.

Let’s stop trying to silence those who disagree with homosexuality and are exercising their First Amendment rights to speak the truth about this lifestyle.

My heart goes out to youth who are sexually confused. Let’s not add to their confusion by a deception that tells them they were always meant to be that way.

Sincerely,
Edie Walter
Anoka

Attend caucuses

To the Editor:

President Eisenhower said that politics ought to be the part-time profession for every citizen.

The precinct caucus is where the political process begins. Neighbors get together to discuss the issues of the day. They elect people who will decide who will conduct the business of their party. They begin the process that will eventually pick the candidates who will run for office.

Most people get to choose between the candidates selected by the party in November, but the caucus is everyone’s chance to have a voice in the process.

We chair the two parties in Senate District 49 and may often disagree on political matters, but we do agree that the precinct caucus is an important opportunity, if not responsibility, for each citizen to make their voices heard.

The caucuses for both parties will be held Feb. 7 and will begin at 7 p.m. and all voting will be held open until after 8 p.m. so that everyone can have their say.

This year in Senate District 49 the GOP caucuses will meet at McKinley School in Ham Lake for all Ham Lake precincts. Oak View Middle School in Andover for all precincts in Andover save precinct three. Andover precinct three and those precincts in Coon Rapids that are part of Senate District 49 will meet at Coon Rapids Middle School.

For the DFL all precincts in Senate District 49 will meet at Andover Senior High School.

Double standards have always been the method of those who promote the dark side of human behavior.

After reading Katrina Plotz’s letter titled “Spreading hate” in the Dec. 30, 2011 Anoka Union it is clear that she is applying a double standard to LGBT controversy in Anoka Hennepin School District 11.

It appears that Plotz wants to express her views which is fine, but does not what ABC Newspapers to publish the view of others.

I hope that ABC Newspapers does not get intimidated with the statement similar to Katrina Plotz’s and continues to allow the citizenry to express their views within the guidelines outlined by the newspapers.

Gene Hodel
Oak Grove

Disagree respectfully

To the Editor:

After reading my friend Roger Johnson’s last letter to the editor (Jan. 6), I find I must disagree respectfully with his conclusion that “businesses do not create jobs, businesses in general want to kill jobs” and his statement that “tax cuts for businesses are in and of themselves actually a theft of the very conditions that keep an entire society vibrant and fully employed.”

He is referring to a common Keynesian theory that was popular in post-World War II Europe that stated that insufficient buying power caused the Depression and that the best solution was an active government policy that could guide the economy. Keynes believed that market forces did not adjust quickly enough and argued that the government should solve problems in the short run as opposed to allowing market forces to correct them in the long run because “in the long run, we are all dead.”

We have seen the result of this philosophy in the fact that during the first two years of our current administration the president and the Democratic House and Senate spent an average of $5 billion a day. That’s three times more than George W. Bush. Now that the Republicans control one half of Congress, there has been an attempt to reign that in, but “obstructionist” is the first charge to be flung. Now we hear charges of “racism” for disagreeing with the White House and the Senate.

While Roger is careful to mention the government as “We the People,” he also ignores the fact that all monies gathered by the government also come from “we the people.” Taxes are an inherently deleterious force on a free market system, but are necessary to allow our government to fulfill its Constitutional responsibilities. What is needed isn’t more taxes on the 1 percent of the richest, because they already pay more in real dollars.

The numbers for 2007 are the most recent available. The top 1 percent: Americans who earned an adjusted gross income of $410,096 or more accounted for 22.8 percent of all wages. But they paid 40.4 percent of total reported income taxes, an increase from 39.9 percent in 2006, according to the IRS.

The top 5 percent: Americans who earned $160,041 or more accounted for 37.4 percent of all wages in 2007. But they paid 60.6 percent of the country’s total reported income taxes, up from 60.1 percent a year earlier.

The top 10 percent: Americans who earned at least $113,018 paid 71.2 percent of the nation’s income taxes, up from 70.8 percent a year earlier.

The top 25 percent: Americans who earned at least $66,532 paid 86.6 percent of the nation’s income taxes, up from 86.3 percent a year earlier.

The top 50 percent: Americans who earned at least $32,879 paid 97.1 percent of the nation’s income taxes, up from 97 percent a year earlier.

The bottom 50 percent: Americans who earned less than $32,879 paid 2.9 percent of the nation’s income taxes, down from 3 percent a year earlier.

These numbers do not include the fact that the bottom 35 to 40 percent of wage earners actually receive more money back from the federal government in tax credits than they pay in every year.

High taxation of the top wage earners has already been tried in many states and the results prove the theory of “foot voting” dramatically. Wealthy New Yorkers fled in droves after Nelson Rockefeller “progressively” increased the New York tax rates to an incredible top rate of 15.37 in the mid-70’s. Bipartisan governors over the next 30 years cut that rate in half and have been credited for fixing the disaster that Rockefeller’s rates caused.

California today has hemorrhaged so many jobs due to businesses fleeing to lower taxed states that it was unable to process 2011 tax refunds for months because it was not able to bring enough money in to pay its bills. Those that don’t move put so much of their money in tax-sheltered accounts that the net result of the increase in practice has always resulted in lower revenues collected.

The Internal Revenue Service needs a complete overhaul as well. For example, a Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times story published 10 years ago, harped on the fact that the IRS audited 1.36 percent of all tax returns filed by people who made less than $25,000 per year, compared with 1.15 percent of returns filed by people who made $100,000 or more. It is a monstrous system that has grown like the mythological hydra, with two problems being created for every fix put in. How does it make sense that an honest taxpayer can call the IRS for help filling out their taxes, receive incorrect information and then be penalized by that same IRS for the information they provided.

To see a solution to all of this: Repeal the 16th Amendment, eliminate the income tax and instead tax consumption. Look for details at www.fairtax.org.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, of course. But stating it over and over again doesn’t make it true. You can have your own opinion, but you can’t have your own facts…even if it means avoiding apoplexy.